Why do we like it that way? Because we associate that with realism. From the book above:
"The most neutral sound reproduction is usually not the goal of sound reproduction except in the control rooms of sound recording studios. In homes, both for music appreciation and home movie theater, the goal for many listeners is rather suspension of disbelief a term used in presence research.
Kleiner, Mendel; Tichy, Jiri. Acoustics of Small Rooms (p. 275). CRC Press. Kindle Edition. "
Ha. Indeed. I've encountered many audiophiles who say the goal of sonic realism is silly - out of reach, stereo can't do it, recordings are too artificial etc.
All of which has some truth obviously. But as I've said, if we have *any* common references for "good sound," among them is certainly "sounds more real."
As to aiding the illusion with reflections, as I've mentioned before: I have a fair amount of flexibility since I have curtain tracks that span the length of all my walls, and thick velvet curtains that I can pull along to any point, and bunch them or expand them to cover whatever portion of the wall I want. Also my 2 channel speakers sit in front of my huge wall-sized projection screen and the screen has automated 4 way masking made of black velvet. That means, by changing the area of the screen covered with black velvet (from entirely open to entirely covered or anything in between of different shapes) I can greatly alter the reflectivity/absorption (higher frequencies) of the wall behind the speakers with great precision. Plus I have some diffusion that I can play with.
So if I want the specific acoustic (natural or artificial) of a recording to have prominance I make the room more dead in the right places. I find this produces what I often think of as "The Portal Effect." It puts me in the mind of the Time Portal from the classic Star Trek episode City On The Edge Of Forever, through which various scenes from past history could be observed:
So the very specific acoustics/reverb and imaging of the recording opens up between and behind the speakers, sounding quite distinct from the room I'm in, like the speakers have become a portal that I'm peering through to another acoustic/event. Which can be really cool.
Other times I want more reflection and especially for listening to orchestral music. But it's a careful balance because I want to hear the acoustic qualities of the recording, and the more room reflections I allow the more those become homogenized, and also if the room is too live it starts to sound like the orchestra is now in my small room - like I've imported a small orchestra in to the room behind the speakers.
I find if I get the balance of reflection just right (I have markings for it), then a sort of magic happens in terms of the illusion. The acoustic of the recording dominated but there is just enough room reflection to ease away the boundaries, the hard lines, of the soundstage created by the recorded acoustic...and then the sense of acoustic space just seems to open up. So the sensation of my sharing the acoustic space, of peering through significant acoustic depth in to a hall to an orchestra, is quite convincing (with a little help from my imagination of course).
So one of the goals I have for how my system sounds is that, when I want, I can get the sensation of "instruments playing in free space" similar to what I hear live, vs sounding canned and contained in some sort of artificially squeezed acoustic.
Every time I go to a live concert, I listen to see if I can hear "pin point imaging" and it is never remotely there. Everything is diffused. That is what reflections do.
Just like you I pay attention to imaging when listening do live acoustic music. I certainly hear imaging (and I've always tended to favor the closer seats at symphonies).
Is it "pin point?" That can be hard to agree upon because it's pretty subjective what we might mean by "pin point," as in how precise does it have to be for any particular individual to think "this is pin-point imaging!"
Where I live, in a downtown-adjacent area, there is almost constant live music being played in the streets - usually small folk or jazz groups, live un-amplified instruments. When I stop, close my eyes and listen for imaging it's actually pretty close to plenty of small group recordings I play on my system.
I would say that the live imaging is actually quite precise - I can point to exactly where the trombone player is and that he is several feet in front of the drums etc.
So it shares some imaging precision with my system but the live imaging is not "pin point" in how I think of it, because sonic images in recordings I find are themselves squeezed in to tinier versions. So your average trumpet section in a funk recording sounds like they've gone through a black hole and been reduced to toy size vs a live horn section in front of you. Likewise for any single instrument in most recordings. Drum cymbals that in real life sound like large resonating metal discs become tiny little bright spots of sound in most recordings. They are "reduced to pin point images" in the soundstage. So in that sense I don't associate live sound with pin point imaging.